Welcome to Real Debate Wisconsin (RDW). This is primarily a conservative blog but we always welcome input from all points of view. Things get heated upon occasion but we ask that our readers do their best to keep things civil and respect all participants. We always welcome guest posts, so if there is something you would like to share feel free to email me at fkd1015 at yahoo dot com.

February 23, 2008

Multiple Montana leggies are threatening to pull out of the United States if they don't like the result of the Heller vs. D.C. case currently pending before the Supreme Court.

It seems the compact signed by Bemjamin Harrison to bring Montana into the union included a provision guaranteeing Montana residents the right to bear arms. Should the Supreme Court take that away they feel that compact will be void and if they choose they could leave the union...

House Administration regulations state that house.gov domains must “be recognizably derivative or representative of the name of the Member of the name of the office sponsoring the website.” The name of an official House.gov Web site also must not be a slogan or imply in any way that the House endorses a specific commercial product, commodity or service, the regulations state.

They are enforcing this to shut down a site on earmark reform, earmarkreform.house.gov...

Only problem is they have no issue with this one, globalwarming.house.gov...

We all take ourselves and our principles seriously, hew to our beliefs and feel noble and uplifted by that. At this age, I'm not as worried about making myself feel noble or feeling ideologically pure, or making a lonely, pious, but ultimately self-defeating, stand on election day.

It can be just as noble to stop worrying about how you feel about yourself, but think about how the vote might affect others, especially friends and family in risky military jobs who are subject to presidential decisions, whether being put in harm's way, being placed under command of an international body, or handed over to the ICC.

I can't risk those things in exchange for feeling conservatively pure. I'll take the "stain" of voting for an imperfect candidate for it.

February 22, 2008

Two more Iraqis with false Bulgarian passports were detained by Mexican officials in Monterrey bringing the total to four this month.

Wisam Gorgies, a 34-year-old man, and Rana Nazar Peyoz, a 26-year-old woman, reportedly flew from Madrid and landed in Monterrey, according to reports in two Mexican newspapers today.

Following questioning, the pair admitted they intended to reach the United States. They were taken to Saltillo in the state of Coahuila, for final determination of their status.

Mexican officials said the are investigating “a network that could be made up of Mexicans operating in Greece who are selling false Bulgarian passports for $10,000 to European and Middle Eastern citizens.”

Earlier this month, El Universal, a daily in Mexico City, reported two other Iraqis, Markos Ramy, a 25-year-old man, and Sollem Pate, a 20-year-old woman, presented Bulgarian passports upon arrival at the Monterrey airport after a flight from Spain.

I recently asked Dr. Christopher Landsea to consider becoming an occasional contributor to RDW on the topic of climate change. I knew it was a longshot, but if you never ask you'll never know.

I'm a big fan of Dr. Landsea's ethics. In the field of climate research ethics are something we are sorely lacking these days. I first became aware of Dr. Landsea when he resigned from a study sponsored by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. They hired him in the wake of hurricane Katrina to determine if there was a link between increased hurricane frequency/strength and global warming. When the people who hired him came out claimed there was such a link before any research was actually done Dr. Landsea resigned.

Dr. Landea currently works as Science and Operations Officer NOAA/NWS/National Hurricane Center and he is without a doubt one of the foremost climate researchers in the world today.

He did reply to my offer and currently has declined it saying, "I've pretty much stayed off of the blogging thus far, but perhaps I should join in at some point." He would be welcome at any point.

Dr. Landsea also pointed me to a study he just published with five colleagues in Natural Hazards Review about hurricane damage in the US.

The long and the short of that study is that the storms are no more intense than they ever have been, however damage has increased due to increased development of shoreline areas.

February 21, 2008

This thing has been debunked in every possible way already and the NY Times has been shown to be the liberal piece of fish wrap it always has been. (you libs keep on denying that media bias now...) In fact I bet this story winds up costing them millions from a defamation lawsuit.

My question is to the hardcore conservatives out there.

Will this attack on Senator McCain by the NY Times make the base more sympathetic to him?

I got a fund raising email from the GOP today asking for cash to fight the lies of the media. Will it be effective? Will this make it easier for many who have been turned off by Senator McCain to support him in the wake of ridiculous attacks from the leftist media?

The Free Thinking Teacher has reformed his blog with some interesting additions...

Randy will take the lead role as he re-opens stepping down from his role of educational reporter here.

Adding to the Free Thinking will be:

Paul - another elementary school teacher from the big bad MPSLaura - RUSD elementary teacherCathy - a student teacher looking for insight into her soon-to-begin careerGreg - a department chair at a Wisconsin technical college

Educational insight from the inside is always a fascinating read to me.

HONOLULU (AP) - A U.S. Navy cruiser blasted a disabled spy satellite with a pinpoint missile strike that achieved the main mission of exploding a tank of toxic fuel 130 miles above the Pacific Ocean, defense officials said.

Destroying the satellite's onboard tank of about 1,000 pounds of hydrazine fuel was the primary goal, and a senior defense official close to the mission said Thursday that it appears the tank was destroyed, and the strike with a specially designed missile was a complete success.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates ordered the shootdown, which came late Wednesday as he began an eight-day, around-the-world trip on which he likely will face questions about the mission.

The elaborate intercept may trigger worries from some international leaders, who could see it as a thinly disguised attempt to test an anti-satellite weapon—one that could take out other nation's orbiting communications and spy spacecraft.

February 20, 2008

I caught a few minutes of President Elect Senator Obama's speech last night. In it he came with the usual stump speech about CEOS who make the same in ten minutes as the average American worker does in a whole year.

So I thought to myself what does the average American worker make in a year?

According to that vast bastion of all things statistical, the Census Bureau, in 2006 the Average American earned $48,201.

If you do the math and take that $48,201 for 10 minutes and multiply it by 6 to come up with an hourly wage you get $289, 206 per hour.

Mr Sinclair is making some rather outrageous claims about Senator Obama regarding an encounter they had back in 2003.

I'm not going to repeat those claims here, you can find them easily enough if you are interested.

Mr. Sinclair has agreed to a polygraph as a means to cement his claims and has issued a challenge to President Elect Senator Obama to do the same.

Whitehouse.com has put up $10 grand for Sinclair to take this test and has offered him $100,000 if he passes the test.

The Obama camp is of course ignoring Sinclair's claims and Obama supporters think the Clinton camp is behind all of this. For Obama supporters to try and slime the Clinton camp with this without any proof is no better than what Sinclair is trying to pull if he has no proof.

The mainstreamers will not touch it with a 10 foot pole.

I'm curious to see how Sinclair does on the polygraph. Frankly I hope he fails it miserably.

Pending upon which study you believe a polygraph has an accuracy of between 80 & 98% so it is certainly NOT an accurate measure of any subject's truthfulness no matter what the result of the exam. (I guess it matters what the definition of "is" is.)